Revaz "Rezo" Chkheidze was a Georgian film director, best known for his Soviet-era drama films, including his 1964 World World War II-themed Father of a Soldier.
Education
Born in Kutaisi in the family of the writer Davit Chkheidze (he would be executed during the Great Purge in 1937), Chkheidze studied acting at Tbilisi State Institute of Theatre from 1943 to 1946 and continued his education under Sergei Yutkevich and Mikhail Romm at Gerasimov Institute of Cinematography in Moscow from 1949 to 1953.
Career
Chkheidze directed twelve films and a television miniseries between 1953 and 2008. His 1964 film Father of a Soldier was entered into the 4th Moscow International Film Festival. During the Soviet era, Chkheidze was a Communist Party member and also served as secretary of Georgian Soviet Socialist Republic Union of Cinematography, then a top decision-making body in the field, from 1963 to 1981.
Also, he was twice elected to the Supreme Soviet of the Soviet Union in 1974 and 1979.
He was appointed executive director of Georgia"s Kartuli Pilmi studio in 1973, a position he held, intermittently, into the 1990s. A star in his honor was opened by Georgia"s Ministry of Culture in front of the Rustaveli Cinema in Tbilisi in 2013.
Revaz Chkheidze died on 3 May 2015. He was buried on 7 May at the Didube Pantheon in Tbilisi.
Chkheidze"s daughter Tamar (b 1960) is a historian and former Soviet-era dissident who was active in Georgia"s politics in the 1980s and early 1990s.